Our last blog introduced you to the Benioff Ocean Initiative (BOI), an organization that works to ensure a healthy ocean for future generations through a wide variety of ocean cleanup projects.

In our last blog, we introduced you to several companies leading the ocean recyclable plastics market. A particularly successful organization is The Ocean Cleanup Project, headed by a team of Dutch scientists.

The abundance of trash in the ocean is a problem most of us, are aware of. While awareness is a necessary step in finding a solution, there are already many companies taking an innovative approach to this environmental issue.

The plastic industry is shifting due to the growing awareness and demand of environmentally friendly and reusable material. Manufacturers have started to focus on bioplastics, as a way to both market themselves as planet-friendly while adhering to government regulation.

Self-healing polymers are an artificially developed polymer that are capable of repairing damage to a variety of building materials on their own, without the need of human intervention.

The demand for bioplastic or green polymer packaging—material produced from biomass and/or material that is biodegradable—is on the rise and is expected to grow more than 7% annually through 2023.

In 2017, about 140 billion pounds of plastic are recycled annually around the world and 60% were from post-consumer sources, i.e. waste from end consumers that was discarded and not made into another product. Examples include tissues, packaging, human and animal waste, and broken or outgrown items.

Plastic – a material found within an abundance of everyday products ranging from water bottles to polyester clothing – is not going anywhere despite its massive presence in landfills, on the sides of roadways, and floating in oceans and lakes.